You could see it on the faces of the players, coaches and fans. After
the Game 7 loss to the Canadiens it wasn’t just disappointment the team
and fans felt, it was utter dejection. The Washington D.C. area hasn’t
had that great of a time in the sports world lately, and the local fans
had latched onto the Capitals as their next hope for any kind of
success. Seeing their team fall way short of their goal, yet again, was
demoralizing.

“I feel bad
for the city right now, for D.C.,” Nicklas Backstrom said.
“The fans have been supporting us all year and we can’t do better for
them.”

Bruce Boudreau echoed that sentiment, saying,
“We’re more upset that we have so many great fans that we wanted them to
continue to be happy. We wanted to win it for them as much as we wanted
to win it for us. So we’re disappointed for the whole area because we’ve
grown this into a hockey area and we want it to stay that.”

There
has been some talk of firing the coach or blowing the team up, focusing
on the system that supposedly will never work in the playoffs. While
there certainly needs to be some changes that are made, I’m not going to
go as far as saying that the team needs to start over. Some adjustments
in the makeup of the players’ approaches, and perhaps some slight
personnel changes and the Capitals could finally get over the playoff
hump that’s turned them into the next San Jose Sharks of the NHL.

Um, I don’t think the Crapitals have to worry about their fan. Wait, they have more than one?

jf - May 5, 2010 at 1:25 PM

Excellent input Kevin, they only sold out every game this year. It was a huge let down for the area. Changes need to be made, you can’t waste the prime of superstars like ovie and backstrom with sub par defense and coaching. As shown last night Pittsburgh has the defense and goaltending to shut down a team even when a goalie is hot. Crosby has been getting all the credit but give it to the real winners the defense and goaltending. OV and Nicky did there parts with 10 points each, they arent the problem. The Caps have a huge amount of offensive talent but their defense is sub par, hopefully carlson and alzner who were the only bright spots in the playoffs turn out to be the answer.

Habs4Life - May 5, 2010 at 1:26 PM

West Virginia…LOL. Has all that inbreeding made you forget that your state is so small and miserable you don’t even HAVE a professional sports team?